Importance of Assessment in Teaching and Learning

 

What is the role of assessment in teaching and learning?

 

“Use the assessment process and it’s results not to monitor and grade that student learning, but to support it.” Rick Stiggins from Pearson ATI (FIP Module Formative Instructional Practices)

 

    This week’s module was so deep and rich. The idea of assessment and learning targets is something that I didn’t understand well prior to enrolling in my education program but it was something I quickly became passionate about. I love the idea that it makes learning more transparent so that students know what they are supposed to learn, how they are progressing toward the goal, and in conjunction, allowing the teacher to collect data to improve and alter his or her plan on instruction. This week’s journal entry is first a reflection of the highlights of learning through the FIP Modules to help me document and digest those things I want to keep as artifacts for my own classroom, intertwined with reflection.

Five components to the assessment process as outlined by the FIP Module on Formative Instructional Practices:

1. Gather accurate evidence – Why are we assessing? Have a clear sense of purpose

2. What is it that needs to be assed? Clear learning targets

3. Design assessment that foots back to the targets and purpose

4. Results need to be utilized – effective communication

5. Student involvement in the assessment process

    I thought the above outlined a clear and practical approach to the formative instructional process. It helps to articulate not only the “what” but the “how”. And then, I thought it was impactful how the module introduced this concept with the analogy of a basketball coach. We as teachers should treat the learning process in the classroom more like practice in basketball, working alongside our students to build up skills and confidence like you would in a shooting drill. Then the summative assessment is like a game… The players put it all on the line but not without adjustment and support from the coach. Great coaches don’t penalize their players for mistakes if they are showing effort. They use them as a spring board for learning and improving.

Student Involvement and ownership over their learning

“Ultimately though, through intentional teacher behaviors, students become more than equal partners in the learning process. They become the most important decision-makers in the learning process.” (FIP Module Formative Instructional Practices)

    In my current placement, I see students are craving the understanding of why they are being asked to do what they do and more autonomy in the learning process. Learning targets are not clearly outlined and therefore, students do not understand how the work they are being asked to complete is helping. Assessments are not being used to inform future instruction. Students are not developing the metacognition to recognize what they understand what they still do not. I believe this placement has been just as a classroom that was high functioning in this area to really understand why this is a critical component of classroom culture. I believe because of the lack of support, we see more behavior problems, more incomplete work, and a higher level of apathy toward the material. So in a way, I’m encouraged and excited to see how I can increase all these elements of the classroom experiencing with taking the students on as partners in the learning process in my two-week unit. My hope is that by clearly outlining goals and objectives, by helping them understand the importance of the learning, and holding them accountable in completing their work we will develop a more enthusiastic and focused classroom.

    One way I have brainstormed to do this is to complete their typical vocabulary worksheet in a jigsaw format rather than independently like they usually do. I am interested to see if they now are accountable to the success of their classmates in addition to themselves if motivation to complete the work and do it well increases. This helps to incorporate one of the high impact practices outlined in the modules: “Have students use self-assessment and peer feedback.”

Developing Student’s Metacognition

 

    There was an idea in the Formative Instructional Module presented by a practicing teacher that asked students to self-identify how they were feeling with the new information being learned in class. Each student had a sticky note with their name on it and was asked to place it on a whiteboard indicating their level of understanding with new material presented in class – Feels comfortable, have questions, or needs support. Students would have to self-assess their ability to grasp the material and place the note where appropriate. What I really liked about this exercise in addition to the self-reflection that was required was that this continued through the whole unit…. Allowing the students to move their note as their level of understanding changed. This helps students not only continually recognize their growth in the learning process but also helps them understand that the learning process is often not linear. A student who starts off in the “feels comfortable” category might jump to the ”needs support” after a new element is introduced. A we should normalize that!! Although I don’t feel like this is an appropriate exercise to introduce to my current placement classroom because of the short duration of the unit, I would like to explore this type of support in my student teaching placement in the spring.

    In addition to the benefit of students’ assessing their own understanding, I feel as though this could be invaluable information for the teacher as well. I once had a young adolescent tell me that she wished teachers would allow her to prove what she knows in other ways than just testing. This type of data that teachers could collect on how a student is feeling about the material could help open dialogue about the assessment process for individual students. If a student had their sticky note in the “feels comfortable” category the entire unit, but then scores poorly on the summative assessment, this could prompt meaningful conversations between the student and teacher about where the disconnects were and how to better support the student’s communication of their learning in the future.

Importance of Learning Targets in the classroom

“If students know, understand, and have a clear vision of the learning targets, they will be able to answer the question: “Where am I going? What they are learning remains the focus of instruction and allows students to understand and act upon feedback, assess and track their own progress toward the targets and set new goals.”

    I dug into the learning target topic last week as part of our journal on the same theme but I wanted to reflect on an approachable way that learning targets were presented in these modules. In the modules, they suggested using sentence stems to create student forward learning targets like:

    - I can…

    - We are learning to…

    - I know…

I really liked the idea of using these targets stems because they are identifiable and predictable for students.  As a student myself, I sometimes find learning targets to be overwhelming because it discusses topics that I am not familiar with (yet)… but I feel like using one of these stems with students would help to familiarize them with this process even when dealing with a new topic. Not only that but it takes learning targets that usually sound very academic and makes them into digestible goals for our students.

    I’ll conclude with the following quote from the Edutopia Article “Take a Deeper Look at Assessment for Understanding”:

"When I go to a doctor for a physical, it's an indicator of overall wellness," he says. "I don't just want to know about my blood pressure. I want to know about my cholesterol level and a variety of other indicators. Somebody's educational well-being is more complicated than their physical health. "In our second generation's standards, we need deeper focus on fewer skills that are central to the 21st century," he adds. "And in our second-generation assessments, we need broader measures, multiple measures that look at the different kinds of things that students have learned and have mastered."” (Furger, 2002)

    I thought this was another real-world example of how looking at a singular data point never communicates the whole picture of a person. So why should we treat our classrooms as such? Only giving students the ability to reflect on their learning progress and performance with a singular summative assessment? We want them to being able to diagnose the learning of the whole student, being able to recognize where they can hone into the learning “diet” to make improvements but not allowing a single data to point to determine their worth as a capable learner.